Invasion
by Mazeem
Summary: The Outer Senshi stand as the last barrier between Wiseman and their Queen. One by one they fall and it is left to a dying Michiru to report their failure, and to teach Serenity a lesson about death. Crystal Tokyo era.


This is something I wrote a little while ago. It was supposed to originally be the finale to a three-shot of various Crystal Tokyo events, but I was never really inspired for the others. I'm not 100 percent sure how well this stands on its own, but we'll see. xD It's OTT in places, but that was pretty much the intention.

Enjoy!

* * *

"Deep Submerge!" Six soldiers of the Black Moon fell to the attack. Sailor Neptune struggled to stay upright, staring around her ravaged surroundings. The gutting of her planet hurt like a physical wound - not that she needed another of those, she thought wearily, both hands pressing fiercely against a gaping wound in her side. One finger rested, terrifyingly, against the slick, smooth warmth of her ribs. She had taken off her gloves hours ago to massage her cold, throbbing hands and goodness only knew where they'd gone. The wonders of Sailor suits, that her now-bare hands were encrusted with drying blood up past the wrists but her uniform was unmarred other than the rip and even that seemed to be slowly re-stitching itself.

"Fine, don't bother fixing _me_," Neptune complained to the magical clothes in a whisper. The oceans surged in her mind and she straightened from her slumped over position just in time.

Pale men dressed in black moved towards her out of the smoke in strict formation. The sight of the dead, inverted moon on their foreheads still made her shudder after all this time. The lead soldier raised his fist, a shard of the Black Crystal gleaming through his fingers. A wave of nausea threatened to drown her, but she shoved it back and reached for the depleted well of power inside her. The crystal. This needed the heavy artillery...

"Submarine Reflection!" The Deep Aqua Mirror materialised in her outstretched hands and soon the men were mere bundles of clothes and bones on the rubble-strewn floor. As the power of the tides receded, her knees buckled. With both hands back trying to hold her skin together, she couldn't stop herself from falling and hit the floor with a horrible jolt.

Weeks of preparation, nearly three full days of proudly holding out against the invaders, of doing her job for the first time in this lifetime. Had she really lost? Would she really die here, in this most pitiful of manners?

"Neptune." The feeble light around her turned violet and with a painful struggle where seconds stretched and whirled around her, Neptune got to her feet and turned around. Pluto stood at the entrance to what looked like a gap into the Time continuum, reaching out to her with both hands. "Come here."

Obediently, Neptune made her way over to the source of the endless light, feeling the unfamiliar change in the atmosphere as she crossed the border into Pluto's realm.

"Why?" she asked. In answer, Pluto raised the Garnet Rob and focused the strength of the Orb on Neptune. "No, Pluto, don't be stupid, save yourself!"

"My planet has fallen."

Neptune stared at the woman in shock, only half-aware of the lessening pain from her side.

"How are you…"

"Alive?" Pluto's voice was suddenly thick. "I am the Time Guardian above all. When all is lost, I must not be. So I fled here."

"You didn't _flee_…"

"I'm stronger here," Pluto continued as if deaf. "Stronger, I think, than anyone, for Time has no end and nothing can stop it - except me, but doesn't that just prove the point?" Tears slid down her face. "What use is strength, when I can't step outside to help?"

"Why am I here?" Neptune asked at last, straightening gingerly. Pluto, composed now, turned away and the air briefly glimmered golden.

"Pluto has fallen. So, now, has Neptune." She looked Sailor Neptune straight in the eye and said calmly, "Uranus has nearly fallen." Panic blazed through Neptune's veins.

"Haruka!"

"Yes." Pluto took Neptune's hand and led her just two steps forwards. "Whatever you do, don't move from here until I say. The flow of time is especially unsteady now." Neptune fought the instant urge to shuffle her feet. "Already the Black Moon Clan itches to leave Uranus' borders. There's no-one," her voice cracked and Neptune too fought back a wave of sadness none the less potent for its familiarity, "no-one left to halt them on Saturn and the Guardian Senshi have retreated to the Queen's palace, preferring to make a last stand together than to fight and lose individually."

"But ..."

"I'll take you to her - on one condition."

Neptune felt temper burn briefly against her cheeks. How dare Pluto order her around, even in these desperate times?

Haruka was too precious to lose in a fit of pique, she told herself, reining her anger in.

"What's this ... condition?"

"That if you fail to defeat the Black Moon's minions, you will ensure that our queen knows we have failed her, and that she needs to prepare."

"Fine-"

"No matter what," Pluto interjected, staring at Neptune with an almost vicious intensity. Neptune returned the look in silence, tension coiling its wires around her lungs and heart.

"No matter what," she repeated at last. Pluto smiled then, her face relaxing just a little. With a wave of the Garnet Rod, the purple-green light cleared from an area directly in front of them. It revealed the world of Uranus.

It had been a world of skyscrapers, of transport that flew and solid, dependable buildings made to survive the fast winds. Now it looked, Neptune thought with a sinking heart, very like her own planet had in her final moments there. Most of the major cities were on fire and the smaller towns were reduced to smoking, crumbling rubble. One city still survived, she saw; the emergency lights of Vitr whirred on the horizon.

"Where's Haruka?" she asked fearfully.

"Wait," Pluto told her quietly. Not long afterwards, Sailor Uranus sprang into their circle of view, brandishing the bloodied Space Sword and panting with exhaustion.

"Haruka!" Disregarding everything, Neptune plunged towards the hole in time. Half expecting Pluto to call her to a halt, she wasn't prepared for a total lack of resistance as she crossed the border into real time and fell to her hands and knees with a crash as a result. She scrambled to her feet and met Uranus' shocked gaze.

"Neptune?" she asked disbelievingly. Neptune nodded and hurried to stand next to her. Their hands touched briefly.

"Uranus," she said comfortably. "Let's get to work, hey?"

A grin spread slowly across Uranus' thin, dirty face and she nodded, unquestioningly accepting Neptune's welcome presence.

"Should be another lot arriving in the next few minutes - I drew them away from an escape shuttle."

Uranus had predicted accurately; soon they heard the _clump-clump _of marching feet. Very quickly the sound faded, drowned out by the unusually painful intensity of their planets' warning.

"Ah, the outer solar system warriors," boomed an unfamiliar voice. Out of the gloom ahead came four rows of soldiers, twenty-four in all, and behind them floated a huge cloaked figure. "You don't know me, oh brave soldiers? I am Wiseman."

Both Neptune and Haruka knew the name. Feeling his immense power and evil as a near-tangible stench even from this distance, they acted together instinctively.

"Submarine Reflection!"

"Space Sword Blaster!"

The blaze of light and power from the double talisman attack faded and both senshi gasped to still see Wiseman unharmed, though the soldiers in front of him were dead.

"Pitiful." A rotting hand drew his concealing cloak momentarily aside and the full power of the Black Crystal hit the senshi like a physical blow.

Neptune felt her skin tear open again and screamed. She didn't dare put a hand near to check, but it felt deeper and wider than before. Uranus tried to help her but found herself incapacitated by nausea, spattering bile onto the rocky ground.

"Pitiful," Wiseman said again. He glided towards the senshi, stopping a good ten metres away. "I expected more from you."

Neptune came out of a grey haze of pain to find Uranus supporting her while glaring furiously at Wiseman.

"You'd have got a hell of a lot more from us if it'd been a fair fight! Does this _look_ fair, Death Phantom, or are you as stupid as you look?" Uranus shouted.

The spectre seemed to flinch.

"Didn't think we knew your true name, did you?" Neptune said between breaths. Finding her feet, she eased herself out of Uranus' arms and stared up at the cloaked figure with the blackness that still fogged her vision. "Look at the trouble your army's had just getting to the first three Solar planets - there are four more to go before you can even reach Earth and all are guarded by senshi that will fight to their deaths!" She tottered slightly but smacked away Uranus' attempt at help.

"But, Michiru-"

"Quiet, Uranus," Neptune said out loud. Her blood was boiling with lust for the battle that would come whether or not Wiseman took her bluff - she would die but she would die defending her queen, her kingdom and her lover. She didn't need Uranus' distractions; she didn't need to remember her injury and weakness. Concentration, that was the key.

_Key_, the sea sighed, trying to tease out a memory. _Quiet_, she soothed_. It doesn't matter_.

Uranus had moved to her side and as a pair they looked at the formidable being before them.

"Good bluff, Sailor Neptune," he replied at last. "I know that Saturn is barren, and my spies have reliably informed me that the Guardian senshi will always retreat to their beloved Earth at the first sign of trouble."

"Pluto-" Uranus blurted out defiantly. Neptune closed her eyes.

"Pluto's planet is lost, along with her physical form. She's now haunting the Time Gates, irritating creature that she is. I'll find a way to deal with her - after I've destroyed both of you."

Again came the stinking hand and this time, it held not the crystal but a bulging fistful of its power. Almost casually, Wiseman took aim and threw it at Uranus and Neptune.

Neptune felt Uranus' muscles tense to spring away. She tried to copy her but felt the pain rip at her bravery, her determination, coursing in white-hot lunges through her abdomen until she was forced to stop and stand there, useless and immobile. Uranus realised and halted her movement, finding Neptune's hand and gripping it tightly.

Was Pluto interfering, Neptune wondered? Time was suddenly elastic, mired in a sea of mud and blood, every millisecond passing in front of her eyes like a year.

_Pluto - key - Gates_, the sea roared and washed away the barrier she had created to protect herself from the pain and knowledge of her imminent death. She remembered,

_"What's this ... condition?"_

_"That if you fail to defeat Nemesis' minions, you will ensure that our queen knows we have failed her, and that she needs to prepare."_

_"Fine-"_

_"No matter what." _

But now they were both going to die and Serenity would never know, not until it was too late. She watched the dark attack approach and felt a tear slide down her cheek. So close. Any second now. Then suddenly, a whisper of the wind,

"I'm sorry, Michiru," and Uranus swung in front of her, shielding her.

Wiseman's attack hit Uranus with a _whoosh_, sending her stumbling backwards, knocking Neptune to the floor.

"Uranus Planet Power!" Uranus screamed in a voice distorted by fear and fury and pain. Yellow light blazed out in all directions and the wind whipped maliciously at Wiseman's cloak, struggling against the power of the Black Crystal.

Uranus was inhumanly strong, possessed with the reckless bravery of a thousand soldiers and on home ground, surrounded by her native element. She held out for longer than Wiseman was expecting, judging by his expression. With an ugly grunt, he threw a second attack at her; this one travelled the distance in less than a blink and blew the tall woman several feet backwards. She remained on her feet, but the wind began to die down and her eyes dulled.

Wiseman began to laugh as her aura faded and Uranus fell, landing mere centimetres away from Neptune with black mist curling from her mouth and nose.

Haruka!

_Grief and pain and anger and salty tears and the ocean smashing against the inside of her skull, overwhelming her until the world was blue and green but red with blood and black with revenge._

The raging sea swelled beneath Neptune and bore her to her feet. Her talisman lay on the ground, disregarded, as she gathered the force of a tidal wave in her bloody hands and swung it above her head.

"Deep Submerge!" A crackling blue energy sphere, more than triple its usual size, spun towards the Death Phantom who moved to the side in an effort to avoid the attack. It smashed into his outstretched hand and veered off, destroying the remnants of the planet's biggest prison before dissipating. He let out a bellow of pain and retreated, shouting as he left,

"You will die here, Sailor Neptune!"

Neptune swore at his disappearing form, a futile gesture made with the only part of her brain that wasn't screaming with terror for her partner. Still tasting salt in her mouth, she dropped awkwardly to her knees beside Uranus' still body.

"Michiru." A tongue of yellow aura wiped away the black mist that still flowed from Uranus' face and her eyes opened. Her hand twitched and she half raised it. Neptune caught it as it began to fall and pressed it to her mouth. Uranus' fingers were cold and blood-smeared against her lips but she didn't care. It wasn't as though _her_ hands were blood-free. "I tried," the dying woman said ruefully.

"Yes." Tears trickled down Neptune's cheeks. The yellow glow suddenly returned, though a thousand times fainter than before, and reformed into the Space Sword. The talisman landed on Uranus' chest, further impeding her breathing.

"Take the sword," she gasped. "It'll give you enough power to get to Earth."

"How ... Did Pluto ..."

"I thought she'd tell you something. She knew us too well." Uranus' chest rose and fell with a terrible effort now. "Go on. Take it. Go to Serenity." Neptune put one hand gently on the sword.

"I don't know if I can," she whispered, watching her fingers quiver. That hand was on the torn side of her body. Moving it hadn't hurt ... not then. She could feel it pressing at her mind. An endless expanse of pain loomed ever closer. A chasm, its mouth open hungrily. A hole to fall through and never climb free.

_Concentration. I must not fall. Not now._

Switching hands wasn't an option. She would hold Uranus' hand until there was no Uranus left to feel it.

"Of course you can." Uranus told her hoarsely. Slowly, Neptune's hand closed around the sword's hilt and she slid it off Uranus' chest, towards her bent legs.

The moment that the sword lost contact with her fuku, Uranus inhaled sharply, her chest rising until Neptune feared her lungs might burst. She exhaled through lips pursed with pain and as the air flew from her lungs in a macabrely cheerful tune, her fuku disappeared in a flurry of swirling petals.

More tears. Neptune had no choice but to let them fall as she stared at Haruka, clad only in the male underwear she'd bought her for a birthday present four years ago.

"You were asleep when the alarm came, hey?" A fake smile. "Sleeping on the job. Tut."

"Tut." A shallow breath in. "Glad ... you came."

"Me too."

"Thanks, Michiru." Haruka's eyes rolled up until only the bloodshot whites could be seen and her final breath rattled from her open mouth.

Neptune waited until every stray movement had stopped and only Wiseman's evil magic was left swirling in and out of the beautiful corpse. Finally she let go. With her now free hand, she brushed Haruka's blonde hair back with her palm then bent her head until their lips met. She tasted of blood and sweat and the taint of dark forces but Neptune didn't recoil. One last, tender kiss to lips that could no longer react with knee-wobbling passion. A goodbye.

* * *

_"No matter what." _

"Oh, shut up," she hissed to the memory of Pluto's voice, some time later. She stared aimlessly at her talisman, only to widen her eyes in shock as a telltale ripple creased its smooth surface and realisation crashed into her head with a boom. "You knew all along that this would happen!" She glared at the sky and her voice rose shrilly. "You knew it when you sent me here, you bitch, you stupid, know-it-all immortal bitch! Why didn't you help? You knew Haruka so well; you must've known nothing I did could have made any difference! It's _your_ fault!" She screamed the last sentence to the merrily whistling winds. "You should have stopped it! Not just ... left me like this!" Blood ran down her bitten lip. "It's not fair. It's not."

Warm yellow light wound around her arm from her hand that held the sword with a death grip. Soothed, she took a deep breath and then took stock of her situation.

Black specks swarmed in her vision as she saw the two pools of blood where she had been; first lying on the ground where Haruka had knocked her then kneeling next to her as she died. Her leg was coated to the knee with the half-dried rusty liquid that had run all the way from the wound under her ribcage and the blood on her hands had long since dried to a scratchy second skin. She wondered how much blood she had lost ... how much she had left to lose. A distorted blue shape shone dimly in the closest of the pools and she gagged uncontrollably as she realised it was her own head. Blood made an excellent funhouse mirror.

_Come on_, she scolded herself, averting her eyes. _Scaring myself won't do any good_.

A stray tear fell onto her collar and she looked at it with honest surprise.

"Only one thing left to do," she whispered. "There's more than just me at stake here." A strand of damp hair plastered itself to her lips like seaweed. She chewed it thoughtfully.

Earth. Crystal Tokyo. The Royal Palace in all its extravagant splendour. With an effort that drove hot nails into her head, she summoned the years-old images from the recesses of her memory. They floated teasingly in front of her, shrouded in mist.

"Sailor Teleport!"

No sense of weightlessness, no _shift_. Her body remained a leaden lump on the ground of a ruined planet. She couldn't do it. She had failed at the last possible hurdle. How ... pathetic.

The Space Sword throbbed in her hand. The sudden blast of light and heat acted like a slap to the face, and she smiled.

"What did you give me the damn sword for in the first place, hey, Haruka?" An attempt at a laugh emerged as a strangled croak. "Sorry. I forgot. I'm ... not myself." The effort of raising the sword hurt to the point where she felt sure her biceps would tear loose from the bone. Still, what was pain worth now? She kissed the sword hilt and slowly, dreamily, rose to her feet. Her hair undulated around her and her head rolled back as a voice that was definitely hers but also, heartbreakingly, Haruka's yelled her last hope into the cold skies. "Neptune Planet Power! Uranus Planet Power! Sailor Teleport!" The Palace solidified before her and she fell towards it.

Floating. Twisting and turning and soaring like a seagull riding an updraft.

An eternity later - or no time at all - she felt solid ground beneath her feet. In the instant before she fully arrived, she took in the scene before her. She was standing - nearly standing - at the far end of a large hall. Sailor Star Fighter stood at the left side, talking earnestly with Endymion and Jupiter. She looked bruised and exhausted, with dirty hair and a purple-green bruise on her face. In the middle of the hall, Sailor Mercury was pointing a scanner of some sort at Sailor Star Fighter and frowning. Half in shadow, at the back, Sailors Mars and Venus were trying to comfort their distressed queen.

_I didn't know the Starlights had problems too,_ Neptune thought dazedly in the second of peace she had left; then the teleport completed itself and there was no more time for thinking.

_Ah_, she thought dimly as her side blazed in an unmatched agony. Her first Earth breath in twelve years came haltingly through unbearable, humid heat and when she tried to take a step forwards, the floating sensation sent her tumbling to the floor._ I should have remembered climate adjustment. _

White lines of pain shot through her vision, swiftly followed by equal streaking of black.

_No. I am Sailor Neptune. I am strong. Dear God, I will not fail here._

"Your Majesties," (was she speaking or thinking? Mars was in the room so it didn't matter, and thank heavens for that) "we have failed you."

No more water.

Nothing.

* * *

"Michiru-san?" A warm hand rested on her shoulder, the difference in sensation telling her more reliably than the name change that her transformation had been reversed. She flexed her hand cautiously and went cold with relief as she felt the Space Sword's contours under her fingers. "I know you're awake. We'd like to talk to you, if we could." Recognising Mercury's voice, Michiru tried to open her eyes. The effort made her dizzy and it took her four attempts before she regained blurry vision.

She was in a different, much smaller, room - it felt even smaller because Mercury, Mars, Serenity and Endymion were stood around her, staring at her with obvious concern as she lay like a useless slab of meat on a soft bed. Mercury's hand moved to her forehand, her cheeks, the touch calm and professional. Questions rose in Michiru's throat but her mouth was so dry that all she could manage was a croak.

"Here." Mars held a glass of water to her mouth and she drank greedily, only to have the delicious substance knocked away by Mercury's elbow.

"Not that much, Mars!" The command was rudely sharp, but Mars dropped her eyes obediently. Both such unusual events that they grated on her nerves. She took a deep breath and forced herself to speak out loud.

"Why am ... I still ... here?"

"A bus-load of blood and painkillers," Mars said wryly, her gaze turning unconsciously in the direction of Serenity. Michiru followed her line of vision and saw a small piece of what looked to her like plastic stuck in the crook of the queen's elbow. As feeling seeped back into her body, she felt her forearm stinging and guessed that had been the site of the transfusion.

"Thank you, Serenity-sama."

Serenity smiled weakly at her and Michiru saw with amused resignation that there were tears in her eyes. Honestly, the woman cried over everything. "Where are Jupiter and Venus?" It was Endymion who answered her this time, as everyone else suddenly looked awkward.

"Venus is with Star Fighter, discussing the latest developments in her planet's defence. Jupiter," he paused slightly and Michiru saw Mercury's hand clench briefly into a fist, "was slightly overenthusiastic about donating you her blood and so has ended up in the room next to this one."

_Both Jupiter _and_ Serenity?_

"Mercury," Michiru began, then realised the doctor's attention had drifted and raised her voice, "Mercury!"

"Y-Yes?"

"How much blood did I need?"

"More than Jupiter should have given," Mercury replied, distractedly moving her fringe away from her eyes. "I thought Serenity-san would be the problem!"

_But ... that much blood ..._

"Am I -"

"Right, so what did you want to ask, Endymion-san?" Mars interrupted Michiru, speaking loudly and quickly.

"Oh, yes, of course. Thank you, Mars." Endymion looked awkward, but recovered quickly. "Do you feel up to a summary of events, Michiru-san?"

"Events?" Her head felt full of cotton wool.

"The battle?"

"Ah. That." She closed her eyes and felt the perfectly stationary bed sway underneath her. Gritting her teeth, she swallowed hard -

_I will not fail_

- and opened her eyes again. Mars offered her the glass of water with a defiant glance at Mercury and she gratefully soothed her hot throat before starting to speak. "We'd been sensing an increase in dark power for nearly two months and had been preparing accordingly - or what we thought was accordingly. But when the attack came three days ago, its sheer scale took us by surprise." She shivered involuntarily and cursed her weakness. "At least sixty thousand soldiers landed on Pluto, with vanguards going ahead to keep us busy and stop us giving Pluto the help she needed." They had lost communications after that, so what she was about to say was nothing more than astute guesswork, but she trusted her deductions often more than she trusted her eyes. "As they whittled down the planet's defences, more and more soldiers were sent to our respective planets to beat us down. I'm guessing Pluto fell late on the second day because that was when my planet was engulfed by a horde of those ugly, poisoned _bastards_." She stopped, alarmed by her own vehemence.

"Are you ok?" Serenity asked quickly. Michiru waved her free hand dismissively as she took more deep breaths. Her side had started to hurt again.

"Fine."

"How did you get ..." Mars trailed off, gesturing to Michiru's wounded side.

"Just about to get to that. This second wave of men came ... equipped, would you say? Each captain had a tiny scrap of Black Crystal."

"_Black_ Crystal?"

Michiru wondered if Serenity knew that she had just brought one tightly clenched hand to rest on her chest where the Silver Crystal used to rest all those years ago when she too was a sailor senshi.

"Yes. The opposite of yours. The first time I felt it, it made me so sick that they could overpower me. That's where this first came from." She moved her hand to try and point to it and was hit by a wall of pain that sent the world reeling around her in varying shades of grey.

"Michiru-san!" Mercury's face was very close to hers, panic making the corners of her mouth twitch. She turned her head briefly away to address a frantic Serenity, "The painkiller's worn off," then back to ask Michiru in a voice that was too calm, "Do you want more morphine?"

"No." Michiru choked out. The effort of speaking dragged her back from the whirling abyss -

- _ha, I win again _-

-and she shut her eyes to try and compose herself. When she spoke again, she kept her eyes shut. She was ... tired.

"These soldiers were led by the evil entity called Death Phantom, or Wiseman. He found us. He was too strong. My wound reopened. There was nothing we could do."

"'We'," Endymion interrupted, his forehead creased. "You keep saying 'we' and 'us'. Who else ..." He stopped, elbowed viciously but unnecessarily in the ribs by Mars as understanding dawned. "She's gone?" he whispered. Serenity gasped, a sob tangled somewhere in the back of the sound. Michiru found the strength to shake her head, raising her voice over the renewed swelling of grief in her skull.

"No. She's here." They all looked at the Space Sword. As if to oblige them, it glowed fiercely, casting strange shadows in the small room. A breeze caressed Michiru's cheek and to her horror, she heard Haruka's voice again in her ear.

"Done my bit, Michiru. Well done. See you soon, ok?"

"No!" she shrieked as the light died and the talisman disintegrated to a bundle of golden light-chains in her hand. "_No!"_ She tried to sit up and pain blazed so fiercely that for a long moment she thought she had been cut in two. Limply, she fell back and stared at the ceiling, waiting for the greedy black dots to block her vision.

No more! Let death claim her! Hadn't she been tough for long enough now?

The sounds of alarm and fear and panic covered up by useless orders gradually receded as the blackness swarmed ever closer to the centre of her vision and the pain was washed away in small, wonderful increments.

* * *

"Crystal Healing Escalation!"

Her body flew from the bed to stick, spread-eagled, to the wall opposite.

Light spread in radiant flames through her body and agony unlike anything she had ever experienced swept over her. Her blood cells burst, piercing her veins; she felt her heart shiver in surrender.

The decomposition stopped with a breath-taking jolt and there she hung; on the wall, the very nuclei of her cells frozen in spikes. Still there was pain, chewing eagerly at her sanity, and still - how strange this was, she thought - she could see, still she could touch and smell and think and hear her own screams bouncing off the walls of the little medical room.

Neo-Queen Serenity held the summoned Silver Crystal lightly in her hands, letting it float against her chest of its own accord. Her face was smooth and terrifyingly unreadable. Mist and grey-white luminescence surrounded her small body, creating an obscene umbilical cord between her and Michiru.

"Serenity, _no_!"

"Usako, stop it!"

"Usagi, what are you _doing_?" Mercury, Endymion and Mars threw themselves at the Queen, but were pushed gently back by an invisible force field that she had created around herself.

"Serenity-sama!" Michiru's voice was as clear as ever once she had choked off the screams. "Why are you attacking me?"

"I'm not!" Serenity objected, looking at Michiru with strangely childish confusion. "I'm healing you."

"_This_? This isn't _healing_ me!" Disbelief was quickly followed by resignation - this was still the same person who had handed the Grail to Mistress Nine, still the person who did what she thought was good and _screw_ what was right! She heard herself begin to scream again and saw the queen flinch. "See?" she gasped. "You're hurting me!" Her voice broke halfway through the sentence and answering tears welled in Serenity's eyes.

"I don't mean to," she said uncertainly. Briefly, her hands curled around the Silver Crystal and its light dimmed, but then her eyes flashed brightly with determination again and she protested, "If I hadn't done something, the others would just have let you die!"

"Good," Michiru said softly.

"Mercury told all of us that you wouldn't survive, you'd come back for a bit and then ... what?"

"I said ... good. They should have let me. _You_ should have let me."

"Oh, Michiru-san, don't think like that!"

Michiru felt a tinge of pity soften the red, pain-fuelled rage inside her skull as she saw the distress on the queen's face.

"Death isn't always a calamity, my Queen. Everyone in this room has died before."

"I won't lose one of my senshi!" Serenity said stubbornly, tears trickling down her face.

"Usagi-chan ..."

"I'm not a little girl any more, Michiru-san!"

"No. I'm not one of your senshi any more, either!" Michiru's head felt as though it was three times its usual size and full of bloody thorns. The screams were trapped in a thick, copper-tasting mass at the back of her throat. "I'm _tired_, Usagi-chan. Please."

Slowly, weeping outright now, Neo-Queen Serenity lowered the Crystal. Michiru floated back to the bed but lay as stiff as a board - the pain hadn't gone. She looked at the queen, who gave a particularly wretched sob and closed her fist tightly around the Silver Crystal, which shone with a blinding white light for a second then disappeared, sent back to its resting place in a high-security section of the palace.

A low moan broke the tense silence and it took Michiru a few seconds to understand that the person moaning had been her.

"Michiru-san?" Lazily, she turned her head to meet Mercury's anxious gaze.

"Yes?"

"How do you feel?"

Michiru nearly scoffed out loud - as if all those machines Mercury was staring at so intently didn't tell her _exactly_ how her troublesome patient was.

"Like a cloud," she said with a smile. Mercury's face crumpled with confusion, making Michiru feel bad. Of everyone involved in this whole facade of peace, Mercury was perhaps least to blame. "Floating," she clarified.

"Oh." Over Mercury's shoulder, Michiru saw Endymion leading Serenity from the room, Mars following a few paces behind.

_Goodbye, Serenity-sama_, she thought. Mars stiffened and swung around. Their eyes met and Michiru gasped out loud as Mars probed the surface of her mind. With a stern face and tear-filled eyes, the fire senshi nodded.

_Goodbye, Michiru-san._ The door closed behind her and Michiru caught hold of Mercury's hand and held it feebly.

"How long have I got?" The floating feeling had intensified - the string tethering her to the world was fraying.

"How long do you want?" The answer shocked her; she stared at Mercury with wide eyes. Mercury returned the look calmly, the tears that had been quivering in her eyes only seconds ago banished by the enormity of what she had just offered.

"No," Michiru answered after several second's pause. "Give me control over this, if nothing else."

"Of course."

Michiru looked at Mercury with wry amusement. Such a fine doctor, so controlled, so professional. This wasn't the way that she would have chosen to end it, surrounded by such antiseptic emotions. She wanted reality, one last time. "Where's little Ami-chan?" Another blank look. "Come on, Sailor Mercury. Show me who you were."

The string gave a fraction more. Maintaining her grip on Mercury's gloved hand, she searched for Mars' mind and thought as loudly as she could,

_Everyone. Come and show me the brave, silly girls I met all those years ago. Say goodbye with your real selves for once in a lifetime_. The effort drained her and she let herself slide into a comfortable greyness.

* * *

She couldn't summon the energy to open her eyes, but she could hear as well as ever. They were all there, Usagi, Ami, Rei, Mamoru - even Minako and Makoto.

_You're the best of us all_, Rei told her suddenly. _You know how much we'll miss you._

_Yes._

"Thank you," Minako said through her sobs.

"Tell Haruka I said 'hi'." Makoto's voice was trembling, though Michiru could no longer tell if it was tears or fatigue. Usagi was unable to speak through her noisy tears, but gasped something that could have been "I'm sorry." Michiru felt breath near her ear.

"I wish we could have raced again, Michiru-san."

_So do I, Ami-chan. I wished for ... so many things._

The world was folding in on itself, each flip of its grey side closing down a thought, an emotion. Memories remained for the longest. Memories of every girl - _woman, soldier, queen _- that had shared their lives with her, of their trials and their victories. Minako, Makoto, Rei, Ami, Usagi.

Their losses.

Setsuna would live on, still guarding the Moon Kingdom and the Gate - protecting Serenity out of duty but Small Lady Serenity out of love.

_Haruka_. Longing ripped her heart in two and she fell beneath storm-tossed waves without a sound to warn her friends. Never mind, Ami would know.

Now the part of her that was truly Michiru wasn't in that claustrophobic room, full of pain and death and grief, she was skimming over ocean waves, tasting the bite of salt in her mouth. Plunging beneath the surface of the ocean, she delighted in the cool currents as they washed over her skin, cleaning away all memories of pain and sickness, of fear, jealousy and rage. She closed her eyes and dived down into the black, inky depths. She thought of nothing as her eyes saw nothing and her ears felt nothing. Her fingers brushed the cold stone at the bottom of the chasm and she marvelled at the strangeness of touching the core of her powers and feeling nothing.

Now she was jumping like a dolphin and soaring like a seabird up, up, into the sky, flying straight for her one remaining memory.

There she stood, toes just touching the wave-tips. The golden glow dazzled her and she halted her flight momentarily - shy of the best thing that would ever be in any life she would live. The soldier of the sky in all her glory, her shaggy hair tousled by the happy winds. She was clothed not in a sailor suit, nor in civilian clothes, but in the same underwear she had died in. Free from all obligations of duty to a world that no longer mattered. Hers again, at last, forever.

_About time_, Haruka said with a smile and extended her hand. Michiru took it and clung to the second half of her soul on the horizon, where the sky and the ocean met and surged together for all eternity.

* * *

If I do ever write the first two parts of this, I'll take it down and repost but for now this'll do.

Be it worship, constructive criticism or flames, all opinions are welcome.

Thank you for reading,

xMhax


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